Alone [with Him]

Edgar Allan Poe's "Alone" is perhaps the most convoluted poem I have yet encountered, and yet still it the most meaningful as well. The diction is undoubtedly quite dense as it twists to fit a rather strict meter while describing great founts about the narrator and his curious predicament. I shall share an imparted meaning, then reflect, as what I believe it to be, could very well be a quite different demon all together.

 

From childhood's hour I have not been
As others were; I have not seen
As others saw; I could not bring
My passions from a common spring.
From the same source I have not taken
My sorrow; I could not awaken
My heart to joy at the same tone;
And all I loved, I loved alone.
Then- in my childhood, in the dawn
Of a most stormy life- was drawn
From every depth of good and ill
The mystery which binds me still:
From the torrent, or the fountain,
From the red cliff of the mountain,
From the sun that round me rolled
In its autumn tint of gold,
From the lightning in the sky
As it passed me flying by,
From the thunder and the storm,
And the cloud that took the form
(When the rest of Heaven was blue)
Of a demon in my view.  

 

Overall, it seems to describe that the narrator is quite different from his peers, going as far to say that it has not only been this way for quite some time, but that which others had, he drew into action from an alternative, perhaps intraflectively. This is particularly achieved by describing emotion, then while identifying the difference of his experience with them versus others, or even at all, he turns towards an ugly spiral of turbulence reminiscent of his childhood life. Alone he was in his plight, and in that loneliness all else came to pass, from the great wonders of the natural world: the founts of pain and pleasure, the struggles high as the mountain stained with effort (blood), the powerful center and source of light/life, and finally the tumultous heavens of the heart. In this lone sanctum was the highest moment achieved after such strain to arrive, and what is there to face upon the sea of tears, but you and you alone, quite different from the other side. Perhaps even a bit a bit as evil as it may have seem just to arrive at such a revelation, or maybe just another mirror to remind you of that endless existence inside yourself, taunting you with futility and eventually doom by you inevitably.

 

Reflectively, I see a lost child that stand apart from what could be considered normal, and there sees through a self journey in the bowels of that conflict. While the circumstances that occur are not clear as to what they are, they do reveal their grandeur in nature, as well as their tumultuous passing. Inevitably this returns the child to himself pass each great and dark wind that he encounters furvorously, and reveals his own true nature, nutured by his lone life and stark upheaval of it. This confrontation is not played out, however it is safe to assume two very possible outcomes from the end point, both quick and intraspective. He can embrace this lonesome life as it is, empowering the demon and embracing the winds as a cape of travels in the sky-bound city as he ventures into the unknown darkness he exudes. Or perhaps he can reject it, which in turn may lead to his seeking an end to such burden, or simply abandonment of it, resolving his lonsomeness all the same, but only in bitter existence for the sake of hiding it all away. Personally I felt as though I could be that child should the poem be me, although it clearly is not, and so I feel that this poem is quite effective at not only stirring your mind, but peeking at your own dwelling spirit as well. Hopefully the mirror seen for real does not reflect that of the unfortunate, or bear something rather unbearable even in spirit.